#AltHallelujah
Last night, Ellen Kushner saw that someone had written verses to the tune of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” telling the Christian Nativity story. So she asked Twitter to come up with some non-Christian “Hallelujah” variations:
I call upon the power of all my genius rhyming friends (and any of theirs) to now crank out a series of increasingly rambunctious songs beginning always with:
— Ellen Kushner, Queen of the Lizard People (@EllenKushner) December 15, 2019
"I heard there was a...."
a/a/b/b/etc. rhymes only, please@lizduffyadams @Signs_of_Life
And Twitter, of course, responded. Follow the link to see many delightful verses.
I think my favorite from that thread may be Amal El-Mohtar’s Carrollian verse:
I heard there was a vorpal sword
— Amal El-Mohtar (@tithenai) December 15, 2019
ate snicker-snacks when it got bored
but you don't really care for Carroll, do ya
well it goes like this, drawn forth in myth
a shouted call, a gleaming gift,
a frabjous boy Calloo-ing, Callalujah
Callay-loo-jah, Callay-loo-jay
but it’s hard to really pick a favorite, because I love so many of them. (A fair number of the pieces in that thread don’t quite rhyme and/or don’t quite scan, but even among those, there are often excellent bits.)
And someone in that thread linked to a thread from a couple of months ago that combined Sweeney Todd with “Hallelujah”:
attend the tale of Sweeney Todd
— Frankie Thomas (@frankie_jay_tho) September 12, 2019
his skin was pale and his eye was odd
but you don't really care for music, do ya?
See also my post from a couple of months ago, linking to some meta-verses.
